Dyslexia

Dyslexia Study Support  – warm reassuring, professional, helpful, personalised.

For students seeking specialist study skills support, flexible  one-to-one study skills support is offered by experienced tutors with professionally accredited dyslexia qualifications in comfortable and confidential settings.

Higher Education Students and Disabled Students Allowance (DSA)

Higher education students living in England can apply for a Disabled Students’ Allowance (DSA) if they have a disability, including a:

• long-term health condition
• mental health condition
• specific learning difficulty, eg dyslexia

You must meet the definition of disability under the Equality Act 2010. The support you get depends on your individual needs and not on income.  Although payments do not cover the cost of diagnosis, DSA is well worth applying for. You could be eligible for dyslexia support and funding towards assistive technology including a laptop with appropriate assistive software programmes..  Evidence of dyslexia or any other recognised specific learning difficulty, e.g. ADHD, will be required from an assessment carried out by a qualified practitioner.

Assessment

An assessment or a screening test can be carried out to identify areas of strengths and weaknesses by an independent psychologist who evaluates an individual’s background, education, ways of thinking, learning and problem-solving techniques as well as their reading, writing, spelling and numeracy skills. A comprehensive and confidential report of the results with future recommendations is compiled.

Dyslexia 

Dyslexia is a learning difficulty that primarily affects the skills involved in accurate and fluent word reading and spelling.  Characteristic features of dyslexia are difficulties in: Phonological awareness, verbal memory and verbal processing speed. Dyslexia causes undue suffering at school, at college and in the workplace.

Signs of dyslexia include:

•    Difficulties with reading
•    Difficulties with spelling
•    Poor sequencing skills
•    Poor short-term memory
•    Lack of phonological awareness – ability to break down words and recognise units of sound
•    Confusion with left and right
•    Problems with reading comprehension
•    Difficulties with mathematics
•    Poor handwriting
•    Difficulties expressing thoughts orally
•    Poor organisational skills
•    There may also be someone else in the family with similar difficulties.